Chinese copycats challenge U.S. small businesses

March 19, 2012 by 1 Comment

HONG KONG – SylvanSport founder Thomas Dempsey learned last summer that a product similar to one he’d patented was being made in China when a customer sent him a link to a Chinese company’s website.

On the website, Dempsey found a recreational camper trailer that looked eerily like the one he designed and patented and sells through his 8-year-old Brevard, N.C., company.

“We were shocked,” says Dempsey. “We thought at first that what we saw was our product, but as we looked at some of the video and photography, we realized that this is tooled up from scratch.”

It was the beginning of what would be a nightmare for any small-business owner. Since then, distributors inSouth Korea and Japan have opted to market the Chinese company’s product instead of Dempsey’s. A Japanese distributor mistakenly thought it was buying products from SylvanSport’s Chinese factory, says Dempsey. Confused consumers have also e-mailed SylvanSport, asking about its affiliation with the Chinese product, owned by Wuyi Tiandi Motion Apparatus, a maker of dirt bikes and camping gear in Jinhua City in eastern China.

These problems have left the promising U.S. upstart, whose camper trailers retail for about $8,000, in a precarious position. While SylvanSport expects a “break-even” year, with sales around $3 million — more than double 2011′s — business could suffer in coming years if distributors keep fleeing to the Chinese competitor, Dempsey says.

In 2011, SylvanSport got about 15% of its sales from outside the U.S. and about half of that from South Korea, Japan and Australia. Dempsey expects 30% of 2012 sales will be international.

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China solar giant faces glare of US trade war

March 12, 2012 by 2 Comments

The low cost of labour, coupled with the massive scale of production at its 14,000-person plant, have enabled China's Suntech to become the global industry leader in solar power in just a decade

In the eastern Chinese city of Wuxi, home to the world’s biggest maker of solar panels, labour is so cheap that workers carry out jobs by hand while machines designed to perform the same tasks sit idle.

The low cost of labour, coupled with the massive scale of production at its 14,000-person plant, have enabled China’sSuntech to become the global industry leader in just a decade.

Chinese producers now dominate the global solar power business. But their success has become a major global trade issue as American companies accuse them of dumping in the US market and receiving unfair subsidies from Beijing.

The US government is due to announce findings on the issue later this month, which could result in duties against Chinese manufacturers.

Suntech denies unfair business practices have helped make it the world’s largest producer, but it makes no secret of its strategy of keeping prices low to boost sales and make solar power available to more people.

“We don’t believe we have any unfair subsidies or anything like that,” said Suntech’s vice president for global marketing Edwin Huang. “We just hope it doesn’t turn into a full-scale trade war. It’s not good for anyone.”

US companies have accused China of improperly subsidising its solar sector as part of a no-holds-barred commercial battle for supremacy over an industry experts estimate will be worth trillions of dollars in the future.

They say Chinese competitors have access to cheap financing from state-owned banks and outright government subsidies aimed at building up the industry, as Beijing makes alternative energy a priority.

At least three US solar companies collapsed last year as global prices slumped, among them Solyndra, which had a $535 million loan guarantee from US President Barack Obama’s administration.

Evergreen Solar, once listed on the Nasdaq exchange, and high-profile Intel spin-off SpectraWatt also shut down.

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Trade deficit hits 3-year record high imbalance

March 10, 2012 by Leave a comment

WASHINGTON (AP) — The U.S. trade deficit surged to the widest imbalance in more than three years in January as imports hit an all-time high, reflecting big demand for foreign-made cars, computers and food products.

U.S. exports to Europe fell, raising concerns that the debt crisis in that region could dampen U.S. economic growth.

The January trade deficit widened to $52.6 billion, the biggest gap since October 2008, the Commerce Department reported Friday. Imports rose 2.1 percent to a record $233.4 billion. Exports were up a smaller 1.4 percent to $180.8 billion. Exports to Europe fell 7.5 percent.

Economists are looking for the deficit this year to widen from last year’s $560 billion imbalance, reflecting in part the economic woes in Europe, which represents about 20 percent of America’s export market. A wider deficit can depress economic growth because it usually means fewer export-related jobs.

A National Association for Business Economics forecasting panel has projected that the deficit for 2012 will narrow by 4.1 percent to $535.4 billion and will edge down further to $525 billion in 2013 as growth in exports keeps pace with import increases.

The economy grew at an annual rate of 3 percent in the final three months of 2011. For all of 2011, the economy expanded by just 1.7 percent, roughly half the rate in 2010. The NABE forecasting panel expects growth to improve to 2.3 percent this year and accelerate to 2.8 percent in 2013.

In January, the politically sensitive deficit with China rose 12.5 percent to $26 billion. Last year, the deficit with China hit a record $295.5 billion, the highest deficit ever recorded with a single country.

At a time of high unemployment in the United States, political pressure is growing to impose economic sanctions on what critics see as China’s unfair trade practices such as a currency regime that keeps the yuan undervalued against the dollar, making Chinese goods cheaper in U.S. markets and American products more expensive in China.

The deficit with the 27-nation European union dropped 11.7 percent to $8.5 billion in January but that occurred because European imports fell 8.7 percent, offsetting a 7.5 percent drop in U.S. exports to Europe. Economists are worried that a severe recession in that region resulting from a prolonged debt crisis will crimp U.S. exports.

The rise in imports in January reflected a 3.3 percent increase in petroleum imports to $39.1 billion and a 10.4 percent increase in imports of autos and auto parts, which hit an all-time high of $25.3 billion. Imports of capital goods such as computers and industrial machinery also hit a record at $44.7 billion. Imports of food products also hit a record high of $9.6 billion with demand for foreign-produced fish, meat, bakery products and wine and beer all rising.

The increase in exports reflected records in several categories with exports of U.S. made cars and auto parts setting a record at $12.7 billion and exports of U.S. made capital goods, a category that includes computers, aircraft and telecommunications equipment, setting a record at $43.2 billion.

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China lambasts U.S. trade bill, won’t adjust yuan

March 7, 2012 by 4 Comments

BEIJING (Reuters) – A U.S. trade bill targeting Chinese imports goes against international rules and Beijing will not adjust the value of its currency to try to bridge a trade deficit that is Washington’s problem to fix, China’s commerce minister said on Wednesday.

President Barack Obama is set to sign the bill into law to allow duties to be imposed on subsidized goods from China and Vietnam, which the White House says will protect American jobs.

“We follow the rules of the WTO, but we have no obligation to follow domestic laws or regulations in any specific country that go beyond international rules,” Commerce Minister Chen Deming told a news conference on the sidelines of an annual meeting of parliament.

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U.S. Congress Approves Tariffs to Combat China Subsidies

March 7, 2012 by 1 Comment

 

The U.S. Congress voted Tuesday to authorize renewed tariffs on billions of dollars worth of goods from China and other countries considered to be state-run economies, a move aimed at countering unfair subsidies.

The measure approved by lawmakers reaffirms the legality of a tariff program in place since 2007 on imports from “non-market economies,” which was struck down by a court ruling in December.

With support across party lines, the House of Representatives voted on Tuesday to give such authority back, following a similar vote a day earlier in the Senate. President Barack Obama plans to sign the bill.

Representative Dave Camp, a Republican who heads the powerful House Ways and Means Committee, said on the House floor that the measure would preserve an “important tool” for the United States.

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Two-thirds of China’s cities fail on air standards

March 6, 2012 by Leave a comment

BEIJING (AP) — Two-thirds of China’s cities currently fail to meet stricter air quality standards that the government wants to phase in over four years to combat notoriously smoggy skies, a senior Chinese environmental official said Friday.

The State Council, China’s Cabinet, on Wednesday issued new limits on pollutants to go into effect nationwide by 2016. It also said major cities must launch programs this year to regularly monitor additional kinds of pollutants for the first time, including fine particles associated with health problems.

Vice Minister of Environmental Protection Wu Xiaoqing said Friday that the government estimates that two-thirds of Chinese cities currently do not meet the new standards, saying efforts to improve urban air quality will be “very hard work.”

“Our task of air pollution control is huge,” Wu said.

The government revised its air quality standards in response to public pressure over pollution and the lack of thorough information about air quality in China. Demands in Beijing for greater government accountability on air quality were fueled in recent months in part by a Twitter feed set up by the U.S. Embassygiving hourly updates on air quality as measured on the facility’s roof.

Wu said the government plans to set up 1,500 new air monitoring stations around the country.

“We also want to build up public confidence in the data we provide in order to better serve the public,” Wu said.

The new Chinese standards require concentrations of fine particulate matter called PM2.5 to be kept below daily averages of 75 micrograms per cubic meter — more than twice as lenient as the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency’s standard of 35 micrograms.

Some Chinese cities generally have much higher amounts than that, and the U.S. Embassy monitoring showed a 24-hour average in the capital Friday of 188.5, a reading that it called “very unhealthy.”

PM2.5 — particles less than 2.5 micrometers in size, or about 1/30th the width of an average human hair — are believed to be a health risk because they can lodge deeply in the lungs, and have been linked to increased cardiovascular and respiratory diseases as well as lung cancer.

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What Does the Future Hold for American Manufacturing?

February 27, 2012 by Leave a comment

The state of US manufacturing is likely to become a major campaign issue - Getty Images

The state of US manufacturing is likely to become a major campaign issue - Getty Images

Written by: BBC North America editor, Mark Mardell 

Drew Greenblatt is an enthusiast: proud of his company, Marlin Steel, and proud of the factory floor packed with state-of-the-art equipment.

I watch, fascinated, as a little white robot squeezes out a wire, putting kinks and bends in it as it emerges.

Then it hands it over to a slightly larger yellow robot, which holds it steady for a twist in the end before turning it over for another twist at the other end.

Oddly, I find this cutting-edge equipment rather cute and cartoonish.

The question is whether this endearing duo are merely the remnants of America’s industrial past or the sort of equipment that will make the USA world-beaters once again.

The factory floor space at Marlin Steel is being doubled and there is no doubt the company is doing well, prospering even, during the bad years. Read more of this post

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FDA Says Brazil’s Orange Juice Is Safe, But Still Illegal

February 23, 2012 by Leave a comment

 

Antonio Scorza/AFP/Getty Images Oranges for sale at a market in Rio de Janeiro.

Antonio Scorza/AFP/Getty Images Oranges for sale at a market in Rio de Janeiro.

NPR      by DAN CHARLES  February 22, 2012

If you happen to notice sometime later this year that you’re suddenly paying a lot more for orange juice, you can blame America’s food safety authorities. The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, after several weeks of deliberation, has blocked imports of frozen, concentrated orange juice from Brazil, probably for the next 18 months or so, even though the agency says the juice is perfectly safe.

The FDA’s explanation is that its hands are legally tied. Its tests show that practically all concentrated juice from Brazil currently contains traces of the fungicide carbendazim, first detected in December by Coca-Cola, maker of Minute Maid juices. The amounts are small — so small that the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency says no consumers should be concerned.

The problem is, carbendazim has not been used on oranges in the U.S. in recent years, and the legal permission to use it on that crop has lapsed. As a result, there’s not a legal “tolerance” for residues of this pesticide in orange products. Read more of this post

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How to Save U.S. Manufacturing Jobs

February 23, 2012 by Leave a comment

By Howard Wial @CNNMoney February 23, 2012: 5:34 AM ET

Howard Wial is a fellow for the Brookings Institution Metropolitan Policy Program.

At first glance, manufacturing jobs would appear to be a dying breed.

The United States lost 6 million manufacturing jobs between early 2001 and late 2009. And despite small gains during the last two years, the trend in manufacturing employment for the last 30 years has been downward.

That has led some to argue that long-term job loss in the industry is inevitable. But our research shows otherwise.

There are two common versions of the “inevitability” argument. One holds that U.S. manufacturing wages are too high to be internationally competitive. The other maintains that manufacturing job losses are the result of productivity growth. Both arguments are wrong. Read more of this post

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How To Invest For Jobs Coming Back To U.S.

February 17, 2012 by Leave a comment

Brian Sozzi, Contributor   2/16/2012

The grand theme I want to put on the table is the concept of onshoring, sometimes called reshoring, which is the bringing back of U.S. jobs from overseas supply chains.

U.S. businesses have started to realize that while workers in far away lands garner miniscule wages compared to their U.S. counterparts, having operations outside of the country can be a strategic disadvantage.  The speed and structure in which information is consumed has caused U.S. consumers to demand top quality products and to want to buy them whenever they please.

Having a manufacturing plant domestically aids in the quicker movement of goods from design table to sales floor.  Furniture maker Ethan Allen is great example of a manufacturer producing most of its products in the U.S. and doing customization for clients, setting itself apart from price-point focused competitors.

Corporate managers are simply getting over their infatuation with cheap international labor and analyzing the total costs of doing business in the U.S. compared to say, China or India.

There is a dollop of icing on the cake here as well.  The topic of focusing on onshoring to boost employment levels seems to be an area of agreement between bickering Republicans and Democrats.  Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum, for example, wants to zero out the U.S. corporate tax for manufacturers.

Anytime the major political parties agree on anything, even the slight thing, it’s cause to sit up and take notice from an investment standpoint.  The Donkeys and Elephants may be a little apart on how to precisely shepherd along the corporate onshoring interest, but at least they are talking the same language.  It’s high time they do find common ground if the following is to be reversed:

  • Manufacturing employment has fallen by approximately 37% since 1980.
  • According to a survey done by the Manufacturing Institute and Deloitte, some 600,000 manufacturing jobs are currently unfilled due to a mismatch between job requirements and experience.

I have read a fair number of columns bantering about onshoring.  Is it overhyped?  Do we really need more jobs in the service sector U.S. economy?  The debates are almost endless.  Unfortunately, though, I have failed to stumble upon investment strategies to profit from onshoring, which has already begun to a certain extent, and could likely gain steam in the years ahead.

Buy-and-hold investors, this should be right in your wheelhouse: a highly probable future event to build positions around in companies with durable competitive advantages.

A few names that come to mind:

  • Waste Management: Owns 260 plus landfills and is the largest waste management business in the U.S.  More manufacturing production means more waste to be piled into the company’s green bins.
  • ADP: Benefits in two manners.  First, workers are hired to run new domestic manufacturing plants (hopefully by people that used the downturn to attain new technological skills).  Second, there should be a trickle down effect in the overall employment sector via a ramp in higher paying manufacturing jobs.
  • Dunkin Brands: “America Runs on Dunkin” as the brand’s slogan goes.  The company’s moat is not as wide as an ADP or Waste Management, but more U.S. manufacturers should mean more egg sandwiches (which Starbucks does not do superbly) and coffee.  Store penetration is increasing in areas of the country that are manufacturing oriented.

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